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Donald Trump has hinted at extending the olive branch to Putin

A top Russian diplomat says Moscow had contacts with Trump's campaign ahead of his election as president.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted as telling the Interfax news agency Thursday that "there were contacts" with influential people in Trump's circle.

"I don't say that all of them, but a whole array of them supported contacts with Russian representatives."

The report did not give further details.

Trump has repeatedly called for better relations with Russia, frequently musing about a rosy world in which Russia and the US get along.

Yesterday, Putin did the same, hoping that the "degraded" relations between the two powers would improve once Trump takes over.

AP:Associated Press

Clinton and Putin had an adversarial relationship

Putin noted, however, that the tension "is not our fault."

The US government believes Putin might have interfered in the election that resulted in Trump's victory.

The intelligence community has concluded that Russia was responsible for hacking into the emails of the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and gave them to WikiLeaks, which released them. Some embarrassed and damaged the Clinton campaign.

Trump made no specific mention of Russia in his first post-election comments but made clear that he wants good relations with all nations.

"We will get along with all other nations willing to get along with us," Trump said. "I want to tell the world community that while we will always put America's interests first, we will deal fairly with everyone, with everyone all people and all other nations.

"We will seek common ground, not hostility; partnership, not conflict."

Putin would be most pleased if the US dropped the sanctions imposed for Russia's annexation of Crimea and its involvement in the continuing war in eastern Ukraine.

That could appeal to Trump's sense that he is the master of the deal.

"I believe that Trump is a practical man; he will lift sanctions on Russia that are harmful to USbusiness," Putin aide Sergei Glazyev told the state news agency ITAR Tass.

The US sanctions have been a strong factor in Russia's economic decline over the past two years, along with a plunge in prices for oil, its major export.

"I don't see the US dropping sanctions ahead of the Europeans ... and Europe doesn't seem to be in any mood to drop sanctions any time soon," Chris Weafer, an analyst at the Moscow-based Macro-Advisory, argued in a written commentary.

He noted that US presidents, even with a cooperative Congress, have less capacity than the Russian president to unilaterally impose measures.